Symphony No. 3 (Górecki)
Symphony No. 3 | |
---|---|
by Henryk Górecki | |
Opus | 36 |
Composed | 1976 |
Published | 1977 |
Movements | 3 |
Premiere | |
Date | 4 April 1977 |
Location | Royan, France |
Conductor | Ernest Bour |
Performers | Stefania Woytowicz (soprano) |
The Symphony No. 3, Op. 36, also known as the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs (Polish: Symfonia pieśni żałosnych), is a symphony in three movements composed by Henryk Górecki in Katowice, Poland, between October and December 1976. The work is indicative of the transition between Górecki's earlier dissonant style and his later more tonal style and "represented a stylistic breakthrough: austerely plaintive, emotionally direct and steeped in medieval modes".[1] It was premièred on 4 April 1977, at the Royan International Festival, with Stefania Woytowicz as soprano and Ernest Bour as conductor.[2]
A solo
Until 1992, Górecki was known only to
Background
Despite a political climate that was unfavorable to modern art (often denounced as "formalist" by the communist authorities), post-war Polish composers enjoyed an unprecedented degree of compositional freedom following the establishment of the Warsaw Autumn festival in 1956.[8] Górecki had won recognition among avant-garde composers for the experimental, dissonant and serialist works of his early career; he became visible on the international scene through such modernist works as Scontri, which was a success at the 1960 Warsaw Autumn, and his First Symphony, which was awarded a prize at the 1961 Paris Youth Bienniale.[9] Throughout the 1960s, he continued to form acquaintanceships with other experimental and serialist composers such as Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen.
During the 1970s, Górecki began to distance himself from the serialism and extreme dissonance of his earlier work, and his Third Symphony, like the preceding choral pieces Euntes ibant et flebant (Op. 32, 1972) and Amen (Op. 35, 1975), starkly rejects such techniques. The lack of harmonic variation in Górecki's Third Symphony, and its reliance on repetition, marked a stage in Górecki's progression towards the harmonic
Composition
In 1973, Górecki approached the Polish
Later that year, Górecki learned of an inscription scrawled on the wall of a cell in a German
Górecki now had two texts: one from a mother to her son, the other from a daughter to her mother. While looking for a third that would continue the theme, he decided on a mid-15th-century
Instrumentation and score
The symphony is constructed around simple harmonies, set in a neo-
The symphony is scored for solo soprano, four flutes (two players doubling on piccolos), four clarinets in B♭, two bassoons, two contrabassoons, four horns in F, four trombones, harp, piano and strings. Górecki specifies exact complements for the string forces: 16 first violins, 16 second violins, 12 violas, 12 cellos, and 8 double basses. For most of the score, these are in turn divided into two parts, each notated on a separate staff. Thus the string writing is mainly in ten different parts, on ten separate staves. In some sections some of these parts are divided even further into separate parts, which are written on the same staff, so that ten staves are still used for a greater number of parts.
Unusually, the score omits
The
Lento—Sostenuto tranquillo ma cantabile
Typically 27 minutes in duration, the first movement equals the combined length of the second and third movements,
- Aeolian on E (double basses, 2nd part)
- Phrygian on B (double basses, 1st part)
- Locrian on F♯ (cellos, 2nd part)
- Lydian on C (cellos, 1st part)
- Ionian on G (violas, 2nd part)
- Mixolydian on D (violas, 1st part)
- Dorian on A (2nd violins, 2nd part)
- Aeolian on E (1st violins, 2nd part)
After the 8-part canon is played, it is repeated, with the 1st parts of the 1st and 2nd violins (silent up to this point) doubling the other violin parts an octave higher.
After that, the canon continues, but the voices gradually drop out one by one, from the lowest upwards and the highest downwards; the instruments in question then double, or play the parts of, a higher or lower voice that is still playing, in this order ('→' means 'double/play the parts of'):
- Double basses: 2nd part (low E Aeolian) → 1st part (B Phrygian) [canon reduced to 7 voices]
- 1st violins: 1st part (highest E Aeolian) → 2nd part (high E Aeolian)
- Double basses (B Phrygian) → Cellos, 2nd part (F♯ Locrian)
- Cellos: 2nd part (F♯ Locrian) → 1st part (C Lydian) [canon reduced to 6 voices]
- 2nd violins: 1st part (high A Dorian) → 2nd part (A Dorian)
- Double basses (F♯ Locrian) → Cellos (C Lydian)
- Cellos (C Lydian) → Violas, 2nd part (G Ionian)
- 2nd violins (A Dorian) → Violas, 1st part (D Mixolydian)
- 1st violins (high E Aeolian) → 2nd violins (A Dorian) [canon reduced to 4 voices]
- Double basses fall silent
- 1st violins (A Dorian) → 2nd violins + violas, 1st part (D Mixolydian) [canon reduced to 2 voices]
The canon ends with all the strings (except the double basses) sustaining a single note, E4.
The soprano enters on the same note in the second section and builds to a climax on the final word, at which point the strings enter forcefully with the climax of the opening canon. The third section of the movement (Lento—Cantabile semplice) is a long
- 1st violins: 1st part (highest E Aeolian) → 2nd part (high E Aeolian)
- 2nd violins: 1st part (high A Dorian) → 2nd part (A Dorian)
- 1st violins sustain an E5 drone
- 2nd violins sustain an E4 drone as 1st violins fall silent
- Violas: 1st part (D Mixolydian) → 2nd part (G Ionian)
- Violas sustain an E3 drone as 2nd violins fall silent
- Cellos: 1st part (C Lydian) → 2nd part (F♯ Locrian)
- Cellos sustain an E2 drone as violas fall silent
- Double Basses: 1st part (B Phrygian) → 2nd part (melody in low E Aeolian)
The movement thus ends with the lower strings, and the piano (briefly recalling the second section of the movement).
Lento e largo—Tranquillissimo
The nine-minute second movement is for soprano, clarinets, horns, harp, piano, and strings, and contains a libretto formed from the prayer to the Virgin Mary inscribed by Helena Błażusiakówna on the cell wall in Zakopane.[13] According to the composer, "I wanted the second movement to be of a highland character, not in the sense of pure folklore, but the climate of Podhale ... I wanted the girl's monologue as if hummed ... on the one hand almost unreal, on the other towering over the orchestra."[19]
The movement opens with a folk
Lento—Cantabile-semplice
The tempo of the third movement is similar to that of the previous two, and subtle changes in dynamism and
O sing for him / God's little song-birds / Since his mother cannot find him.
And you, God's little flowers / May you blossom all around / that my son may sleep a happy sleep.[20]
The orchestra returns to A minor before a final postlude in A major.[4] In Górecki's own words: "Finally there came that unvarying, persistent, obstinate 'walczyk' [on the chord of A], sounding well when played piano, so that all the notes were audible. For the soprano, I used a device characteristic of highland singing: suspending the melody on the third [C♯] and descending from the fifth to the third while the ensemble moves stepwise downward [in sixths]".[11]
Interpretation
The symphony was dedicated to Górecki's wife Jadwiga Rurańska. When asked why, Górecki responded, "Who was I supposed to dedicate it to?"
The symphony alludes to each of the main historical and political developments in Poland's history from the 14th century to 1976, the year of its composition. What is more, each of the three movements appears to represent a different age . . . and [they are] chronologically contiguous. The composer seems to have created three separate and discrete "chapters" in his summary of Poland's history.[23]
Górecki said of the work, "Many of my family died in concentration camps. I had a grandfather who was in Dachau, an aunt in Auschwitz. You know how it is between Poles and Germans. But Bach was a German too—and Schubert, and Strauss. Everyone has his place on this little earth. That's all behind me. So the Third Symphony is not about war; it's not a
Reception
Initial
Górecki's Symphony No. 3 was written in 1976, when Górecki was, in the words of the music critic Jane Perlez, "a fiery figure, fashionable only among a small circle of modern-music aficionados".[22] The 1977 world première at the Royan Festival, Ernest Bour conducting, was reviewed by six western critics, all of them harshly dismissive.[25] Heinz Koch, writing for Musica, said that the symphony "drags through three old folk melodies (and nothing else) for an endless 55 minutes".[26] Górecki recalled that, at the premiere, he sat next to a "prominent French musician", probably Pierre Boulez, who, after hearing the twenty-one repetitions of an A-major chord at the end of the symphony, loudly exclaimed: "Merde!"[27]
The symphony was first recorded in Poland in 1978 by the soprano Stefania Woytowicz.[25] It was deemed a masterpiece by Polish critics,[28] although, during the late 1970s and early 1980s, recordings and performances were widely criticised by the press outside Poland.[25] The symphony drew hostility from critics who felt that Górecki had moved too far away from the established avant-garde style and was, according to Dietmar Polaczek (writing for Österreichische Musikzeitschrift), "simply adding to the decadent trash that encircled the true pinnacles of avant-gardism".[29]
Increasing recognition
In 1985, the French filmmaker
In the mid-1980s, the British industrial music group Test Dept used the symphony as a backdrop for video collages during their concerts to express sympathy with the Polish Solidarity movement,[33] which Górecki also supported (his 1981 piece Miserere was composed in part as a response to government opposition of Solidarity trade unions).[34]
London Sinfonietta recording and commercial success
During the late 1980s, the symphony received increasing airplay on US and British classical radio stations, notably
A 1991 recording with the London Sinfonietta, conducted by David Zinman and featuring the soloist Dawn Upshaw, was released in 1992 by the Elektra imprint Nonesuch Records. Within two years, it sold more than 700,000 copies worldwide;[16] it reached number 6 on the mainstream UK album charts,[35] and while it did not appear on the US Billboard 200, it topped the US classical charts for 38 weeks and stayed on the chart for 138 weeks.[36] The Zinman/Upshaw recording has sold over a million copies,[37] making it probably the best selling contemporary classical record.[38]
Michael Steinberg described the symphony's success as essentially a phenomenon of the compact disc. While live performances are still given, they do not always sell out.[5] Some critics, wondering at the sudden success of the piece nearly two decades after its composition, suggest that it resonated with a particular mood in the popular culture at the time. Stephen Johnson, writing in A guide to the symphony, wondered whether the success was "a flash in the pan" or would have lasting significance.[39] In 1998, Steinberg asked, "[are people] really listening to this symphony? How many CD buyers discover that fifty-four minutes of very slow music with a little singing in a language they don't understand is more than they want? Is it being played as background music to Chardonnay and brie?"[5] Steinberg compared the success of Górecki's symphony to the Doctor Zhivago phenomenon of 1958: "Everybody rushed to buy the book; few managed actually to read it. The appearance of the movie in 1965 rescued us all from the necessity."[5] Górecki was as surprised as anyone else at the recording's success, and later speculated that "perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music…. Somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something, somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed."[5]
At least a dozen recordings were issued in the wake of the success of the Nonesuch recording, and the work enjoyed significant exposure in a number of artistic media worldwide. It was used by several filmmakers in the 1990s and onwards to elicit a sense of pathos or sorrow, including as an accompaniment to a plane crash in Peter Weir's Fearless (1993), and in the soundtrack to Julian Schnabel's Basquiat (1996), in the Netflix series (season 2, episode 7) The Crown, and in Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life (2019).[40] An art gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico opened an exhibit in 1995 dedicated entirely to visual art inspired by the piece.[40] It is also used as one of the songs in the music playlist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research.
Ballet "Light of Passage"
In 2017 Canadian choreographer Crystal Pite set the first movement of the symphony as a ballet called Flight Pattern, commissioned by the Royal Opera House. In 2022 she expanded this into a setting of all three movements, Light of Passage.[1]
Discography
Notes
- ^ Robin, William (9 June 2017). "How A Somber Symphony Sold More Than a Million Records". New York Times.
- ^ Thomas, 163
- ^ "Words in Gorecki's Symphony No. 3 (in translation)". Web.ics.purdue.edu. 1944-09-26. Retrieved 2017-01-27.
- ^ a b c d e f Ellis, David. "Evocations of Mahler Archived 2012-09-17 at the Wayback Machine" (PDF). Naturlaut 4(1): 2–7, 2005. Retrieved 22 June 2007.
- ^ a b c d e Steinberg 1998, p. 171.
- ^ Alison Moore, Is the Unspeakable Singable? Henryk Górecki’s Symphony of Sorrowful Songs and the Ethics of Holocaust Empathy, Portal, Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies, 8 (1) January 2011, 1-17.
- ^ Steinberg 1998, p. 170.
- ^ Thomas 2005, pp. 85–6.
- ^ a b Howard 1998, p. 134.
- ^ Thomas 1997, p. 81.
- ^ a b Thomas 1997, p. 82.
- ^ Górecki 2003.
- ^ a b c McCusker, Eamonn. "Symphony No.3: Sorrowful Songs Archived 2007-06-07 at the Wayback Machine". CD Times. Retrieved on 19 June 2007.
- ^ a b Thomas 1997, p. 83.
- ^ Kertesz, Imre. "Górecki's Symphony no.3, 'Symphony of Sorrowful Songs' Archived 2007-09-27 at the Wayback Machine". Le Chercheur de traces. Retrieved on 7 July 2007.
- ^ a b Blum, Ronald. "The Impact of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Chicago Sun-Times, 26 June 1994.
- ^ Han-Leon, Chia. "Symphony No.3, op.36 (1976) Archived 2007-06-11 at the Wayback Machine". The Flying Inkpot, 9 December 1999. Retrieved on 22 June 2007.
- ^ Thomas 2005, p. 265.
- ^ a b Thomas 1997, p. 91.
- ^ Mason Hodges, John. "A Polish Composer Makes Minimalism Meaningful[permanent dead link]". Critique, 1993. Retrieved on 22 June 2007.
- ^ Howard 1998, p. 133.
- ^ a b c Perlez, Jane (27 February 1994). "Henryk Górecki". The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
- ^ Howard 2007, pp. 215–6.
- ^ Jacobson 1995, p. 191.
- ^ a b c Howard 1998, p. 136.
- ^ Koch, Heinz. "Mit wichtigen bundesdeutschen Beiträgen". Musica 31, no. 4. 1977. p 332. Da schleift einer drei alte Volksliedmelodien (und sonst nichts) 55 endlose Minuten lang.
- ^ Howard 2007, p. 216.
- ^ Howard 2007, p. 217.
- ^ Polaczek, Dietmar. "Neue Musik in Royan", Österreichische Musikzeitschrift, July–August, 1977. 358
- ^ A warrior named Lemminkäinen had been murdered, cut into pieces and thrown to the river at Tuonela. His mother went to the river of God Tuoni, found the corpse of her dead son and brought him back to life.
- ^ Howard 1998, p. 137.
- ^ Wierzbicki, James. "Henryk Górecki Archived 2009-08-14 at the Wayback Machine". St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 7, 1991. Retrieved 29 May 2007.
- ^ Howard 1998, p. 138.
- ^ Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikolaj". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. (London): Macmillan, 2001, v.10, p. 160.
- ^ Howard 1998, p. 144.
- ^ Howard 1998, p. 145.
- ^ "Top 10 Discs of the Decade". BBC Music Magazine. 2002-11-01. pp. 27–28.
- ^ Performing Pain: Music and Trauma in Eastern Europe - Page 134 Maria Cizmic - 2011 soprano Dawn Upshaw, Górecki's Third Symphony encountered a rather incredible period in its reception history: it became the best-selling classical record of all time, even crossing over into the popular music charts in the United Kingdom. [this cannot be correct across all classical categories - see sources for Switched on Bach, Essential Pavarotti etc].
- ^ Layton 1995, p. 401.
- ^ a b Howard 1998, p. 152.
Sources
- Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj (2003). "Remarks on Performing the Third Symphony". Polish Music Journal. 6 (2). Archived from the original on 18 October 2012. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
- Howard, Luke B. (1998). "Motherhood, Billboard, and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". JSTOR 742238.
- Howard, Luke B. (2007). "Henryk M. Górecki Symphony No.3 (1976) as a Symbol of Polish Political History". JSTOR 25779666.
- Jacobson, Bernard (1995). A Polish Renaissance. London: Phaidon. ISBN 0-7148-3251-0.
- Layton, Robert, ed. (1995). A Guide To The Symphony. Oxford: ISBN 0-19-288005-5.
- Steinberg, Michael (1998). The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-512665-3.
- Thomas, Adrian (1997). Górecki. Oxford Studies of Composers. Oxford: ISBN 0-19-816394-0.
- Thomas, Adrian (2005). Polish Music Since Szymanowski. London: ISBN 0-521-58284-9.
External links
- Mikołaj Jakub Kosmalski. "Symphony No. 3 «Symphony of Sorrowful Songs» Op. 36 for solo soprano and orchestra by Henryk Mikołaj Górecki. Contribution to the monograph. The verbal layer, the musical structure and verbal-musical connections in the first part - Lento, Sostenuto tranquillo ma cantabile." Master's thesis under the direction of Hab. Dr. Robert Kurdybacha. The Karol Lipiński Academy of Music in Wrocław. Wrocław2012.
- Kilbey, Paul (29 April 2022). "'The planets aligned!' How Górecki's Third Symphony stormed the 90s pop charts". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 April 2022.